


You’ve Got the Love

by Rosage



Category: Fire Emblem Echoes: Mou Hitori no Eiyuu Ou | Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, Fire Emblem Series
Genre: Alternate Ending, F/F, parenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-01
Updated: 2017-08-01
Packaged: 2018-12-09 15:25:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11671842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosage/pseuds/Rosage
Summary: Faye’s dream comes true, just not in the way she expected. Letting go of any more of it is the hard part.





	You’ve Got the Love

**Author's Note:**

> For ferarepair-week2k17’s day two themes: food, sweet, and family. Not compliant with the canon epilogue. Bits of the past slow burn are coming soon to a femslashficlets challenge near you, but for now, thanks to glitteringworlds for letting me borrow some of her kid ideas.

Faye goes rigid while the kids play in the forest. She follows them with her bow in hand, lifting it at every snapped twig. One of the guilty rabbits earns an arrow between its eyes, and Faye shakes as she gathers it for supper, telling herself she knew what she was doing.

Ahead, Silque shows the children which berries to eat. Three stained faces return to Faye, and she cracks a smile.

Once both son and daughter are home, washed, and put to bed, Silque massages Faye’s shoulders. For all their work from dawn to dusk, Faye can never seem to sink into bed until she’s cleaned an extra dish or mended a shirt.

“You make them nervous, hovering so tensely,” Silque says. “When they get older, they will have to explore on their own.”

Faye rubs the silver plate she’s polishing, a reward for their service in the war, with increased vigor. “My children will _never_ be alone.” It’s why when they plucked their first from the priory, Faye would not leave without another.

“Your children?” It’s mild, but it makes Faye set down her cloth.

“Silque, I…”  
  
“I simply meant that they need to engage with the world on their own terms. I believe I gave someone else that chance.”

Faye nuzzles against Silque’s neck and breathes in the rose scent of her aromatic candles. “No, you’re a busy body.” Silque laughs, light and fond, and her busy body self nudges Faye along to bed.

* * *

Every time Faye hears of a knight at the gates, she grabs her bow. “It’s only our old friend Lukas,” Silque says with a touch on her elbow. Faye’s grip stays clenched.

“He always brings ill tidings.”

“Well, don’t shoot the messenger.” At Silque’s grin, Faye only shakes her head.

If Lukas notices the weapon, he says nothing. He’s only guarding a shipment, so Faye does not stop little Ambrosia from bouncing up to him. Her curls bounce around her face, freckled from lengthening days.

“I hurt my hand,” she tells Lukas, jabbing it toward him.

“Did you, now.”

“I fell from a tree.”

Having finished boasting, she loses interest when he pulls out a book from the shipment to show her. Barry detaches from Silque’s leg to look at it.

Whether or not Lukas was supposed to give it to them, Barry is still clutching it that evening when he climbs into Silque’s lap and she sounds out the words for him. It’s lucky for everyone involved that Silque learned to read at the priory. Faye knows how, but she only reads letters. All the knowledge she needs comes from her life’s teachers: Mycen, who taught her the bow; Alm, who taught her bravery; her grandmother, who taught her when to pull out a pie; and Silque, who taught her about reading the weather, and about kindness.

Ambrosia can’t sit still long enough to learn. Faye abandons her plans to knit and watches Ambrosia run around the garden, chasing fireflies. Fairies, she calls them, but in the evening glow the term suits her better. For a moment, Faye’s heart calms.

It thumps with the rhythm of the blinking fireflies when she realizes she can’t keep Ambrosia in this garden forever, with their carrots and daisies and grapes. She can’t even keep her contained for an evening.

She could never keep anyone in Ram.

* * *

Though he usually holds back when company calls, Barry presents his grandmother with a painting before she can sit. “It’s Mom and Mama,” he says, pointing to the blue and yellow smears. He tells her how he and Silque made the paints with ingredients from the woods, and how they mixed the blue and yellow to paint grass. Faye’s mother holds the parchment as carefully as she once did Faye’s pressed flowers.

Her smile twists Faye’s heart. Faye convinced Silque to raise the children here in part so her parents and grandparents could help. It was not as if Silque had family to stay with. But Faye’s grandparents now rest in the cemetery, and someday her parents will join them.

_When they’re older, we can travel,_ Silque murmured into her hair the night before, after they both woke in cold sweats. Often one or both children joined them, giving no chance for such talks. _Like the pilgrimage I went on with my mother. See all these things they hear and read about, teach them to help people. But this time, nobody will be left behind._

It’s only because of that promise that the idea takes root within Faye.

Still, she’s always dreamed of building a family in the safety of her childhood home. That dream, even if not with the person she imagined, has come true.

After putting Ambrosia’s energy to work serving bread and fruit on their silver plate, Faye takes the moment to wrap an arm around Silque and kiss her. “Thank you for staying with me,” Faye whispers. “With our family.”

“Thank you for the same,” Silque says, returning the gesture with soft lips. She gives Faye a squeeze before the plate clatters against the floor and they duck to chase after rolling grapes.


End file.
